Court of Appeal Says Denial of Welfare Aid for Disabled Students
May Violate Federal Civil Rights Law

By a MetNews Staff
Writer

A state law cutting off
welfare benefits supporting high school students who have turned 18 and do not
appear likely to graduate by age 19 may violate the Americans With Disabilities
Act, the Third District Court of Appeal ruled yesterday.

The justices overturned
a ruling by Sacramento Superior Court Judge Lloyd Connelly and sent the case
back to the trial court for reconsideration as to whether the cost of providing
aid to students whose disabilities prevent them from completing school by age
19 is unreasonable.

At issue is part of the
California Work Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids, or CalWORKs law. The
statute implements the 1996 federal welfare reform law by providing cash
assistance and services to low-income families with children.

It generally cuts off
all aid for a child who reaches the age of 18. The sole exception is under
Welfare and Institutions Code Sec. 11253, which provides that a child who is at
least 18 but less than 19 is entitled to be aided if he or she is a full-time
high school, vocational, or technical student and “can reasonably be expected
to complete the educational or training program before his or he 19th
birthday.”

The state’s
implementation of this “completion rule” is being challenged by the WesternCenter on Law & Poverty,
the Legal Aid Society of San Diego, and Legal Services of Northern California
on behalf of the parents of three disabled students whose benefits were cut off
after they turned 18.

One student was
reinstated after her principal said she would likely graduate by age 19, but
the state stipulated that she could still be dropped if her disability required
her to change to a slower track and she remained a plaintiff. The other
students brought administrative appeals that were denied before they sued.

Connelly found that Sec.
11253 complies with the ADA by creating “an
essential eligibility requirement” as defined by the federal act. But Justice
Richard Sims III, writing for the Court of Appeal, disagreed.

“We agree with
plaintiffs that application of the completion rule to their children unlawfully
denies them the benefits of the CalWORKs program on account of their
disabilities,” Sims wrote.

A discriminatory
eligibility requirement is considered essential under the ADA only if the program
cannot be operated without it, Sims explained. Cutting off benefits for
disabled 18-year-olds is not essential to CalWORKs, the justice declared, and
in fact undermines the legislative purpose behind the program.

CalWORKs, he noted, is
supposed to provide a “secure structure” for family members, and “to achieve
the greatest possible reduction of dependency,” in part by promoting work
opportunity.

“[A] disabled
18-year-old with schooling or job training unfinished is ill-prepared to work,
and having to care for the child without CalWORKs aid may impede the parents’
participation in the work force,” Sims wrote.

There was inadequate
evidence, the justice went on to say, to support Connelly’s finding that the
completion rule is enforceable, under federal regulations implementing the ADA,
because doing away with the rule “would fundamentally alter the nature of the
services, program, or activity.”

While a federal district
judge in Washington upheld the state’s
similar rule on that ground, Sims said, the opinion in that case was
unpersuasive. On remand, the state can present evidence that exempting disabled
students from the rule would “fundamentally alter” CalWORKs or would have an
undue fiscal impact on the state, he said.

Justice Vance Raye
joined in the opinion.

Justice Harry Hull
concurred separately. Calling the law a “quagmire,” he expressed the fear that
the number of students who would be affected by a grant of relief “is not only
unknown but unknowable” but agreed with the majority that remand is
appropriate.